The Bolic Sound Sessions (2021)

The Bolic Sound Sessions is a two disc sampler, featuring previously unreleased tracks as well as alternate versions of original Ike & Tina and cover songs. Disc two features also some live recordings, recorded at Forest National Brussels on October 25, 1975. The two picture discs comes in a paper gatefold cover, including some photos from the duo and extensive liner notes and includes with „I've Got A Man“ a wonderful and never before released track, originally released under the sligtly different title „I’ve Got A Woman“ from Ray Charles in 1954. All tracks were recorded at Ike’s own studio Bolic Sound:

Following the success with the Ike & Tina Turner Review, Ike had the finances to create his own recording studio Bolic Sound, which is a reference to Tina’s maiden name Bullock. The studio was previously a furniture store which Turner bought as a shell and had it fully renovated. Ike started to produce his own records in 1970, before opening for business in March 1972. After his divorce from Tina, he was in financial disarray and tried to sell the studio, but the temporarily uninsured building burnt to the ground under mysterious circumstances in January 1981.

Artists who recorded at Bolic Sound include Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Duane Allman, Little Richard, Gayle McCormick and Frank Zappa. Also the debut single „Uptown Festival“ from Shalamar was recorded there by session musicians in 1976. United Artists Records sponsored their first college seminar in 1973 at Bolic Sound, including a jam session from Ike & Tina Turner.

Release: July 2021
Label: Sunset Blvd Records
Format: 2 CD

Billboard Magazine - March 4, 1972

After nearly a year of construction and the discarding of two completed control booth systems, as not good enough, Ike & Tina Turner's Bolic Sound recording studio is in full operation. And the facility on south La Brea Avenue in the Inglewood district has got to rank as one of the most ornate recording plants in the world.

Bolic Sound contains two 16 track quadrasonic studios, fully equipped and with almost unbelievably lush decor. The building also houses Ike & Tina’s other companies: I & TT Productions, Placid Music, HUH Music and the Spud Nik Booking Agency. The main office boasts a polar bearskin rug and other furnishings not usually standard in music companies. The main floor also contains a fully stocked kitchenette and a wood-panelled lounge with a pool table and Vegas style card table.

However, it is the upstairs hideway at Bolic Sound which makes the studio a truly unique facility. Entered through a gold-lined oval door is a complete apartment to be used by lke & Tina as a home base during lengthy recording periods. Aside from the red velvet chairs and couches and the super-sized bed with platform and canopy there are many other distinctive touches such as a mural of a nude couple which covers an entire wall and a six foot high golden globe-like console ridged like a hand grenade which hides drawers containing a TV set, a stereo and a bar.

Ike & Tina bought the building as a new shell and installed all the opulence from scratch. Even before the facility was fully completed, recordings had been taped at Bolic Sound by Three Dog Night, Bobby Womack, Delaney and Bonnie, Frank Zappa and the Turtles.